The Nigerian electoral commission has extended until this Sunday the voting period in the presidential and legislative elections of two states of the country, due to the occurrence of several incidents this Saturday, reports the EFE agency.
At stake are the states of Cross River, in the southeast of the country, and Bayelsa, in the south.
“We decided to extend the vote this Sunday in Cross River, specifically in the area of the local administration of Bakassi,” justifies, in a statement, the electoral commissioner of this state (southeast of the country), Gabriel Yomere, quoted by the Nigerian newspaper Premium Times. .
The local commissioner of the state of Bayelsa (south of the country), Wilfred Ifoga, also informed about the decision to extend the voting period until this Sunday, due to the protests of the voters due to the difficulties in exercising the right to vote.
On Saturday, the day set for the elections, those responsible for the electoral commission expressed their opposition to any type of postponement of the polls, even with the existence of technical problems and the threat of violence.
According to Premium Times, the electoral commission even threatened to cancel the election results in parts of Kogi state (central part of the country), citing the local commissioner, after several violent incidents in the eastern and western region, with the theft of ballots from vote.
In addition, observers from the Nigerian Center for Journalism Innovation and Development and other civil society groups denounced “consistent misconduct by election commission and polling station clerks,” accusing them of being late. to the voting centers.
The organization Human Rights Watch (HRW) warned about the existence of a “general climate of insecurity” that affected the electoral act.
“This has created a climate of fear that may discourage people from voting. Concerns remain about the violence that is taking place across the country. A violence that security forces have been unable to stop,” said the HRW activist. Anietie Ewang.
Monitoring group Yiaga Africa also said it was “deeply concerned” about delays in elections and analysis firm SBM Intelligence recorded “acts of intimidation and violence” in at least 13 states on Saturday.
About 94 million Nigerian voters were called to the polls on Saturday to choose a successor to 80-year-old Muhammadu Buhari, who has been in power since 2015 and is constitutionally barred from running for a third term.
There are 18 candidates and at least 4,223 people nominated for the position of head of state for the 469 seats in the National Assembly, 109 senators and 360 deputies in the House of Representatives.
For the first time since 1999, the presidential election could be decided in two rounds, due to the growing popularity of an alternative candidate to the two parties that have historically contested the position.
Bola Ahmed Tinubu of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) and Atiku Abubakar of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP, the largest opposition party) are the strongest candidates in a system that has remained stable since the end of the military dictatorship in 1999, but which, this time, is challenged by an “outsider”, Peter Obi, of the Labor Party (LP), leader in the main pre-election polls.
The results of the elections will be announced by the INEC next week.
Nigeria is the most populous country in Africa, with 222.182 million people and almost 94 million registered voters, of whom almost 40% are under 35 years of age.
Despite being the largest economy in Africa and one of its main oil producers, Nigeria is in an economic crisis.
Source: TSF
